Far into the Yellow Wood
by wildpeace
Summary: If you could change one thing to spare someone pain, would you? Metro Detective Anthony DiNozzo meets Israeli Prima Ballerina Ziva David, and nothing is ever the same again.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Far into the Yellow Wood

Author: Wildpeace

Rating: K+

Summary: If you could change one thing to spare someone pain, would you? Metro Detective Anthony DiNozzo meets Israeli Prima Ballerina Ziva David, and nothing is ever the same again.

Disclaimer: I do not own NCIS, Tony, Ziva, Gibbs, Abby, Ducky, McGee or any of the other recognised characters that lie herein. I do not even really own Oliwia, but the real version is 4 years old and quite the kleptomaniac. She is however teaching me to say 'Merry Christmas' in Polish.

A/N: Quite honestly, I don't think I've ever worked as hard at a fic as I have at this one and mainly I have to thank the people who helped me wrestle ornery words into something like submission.

First G, who remembered she loves me more than she doesn't love AUs – thank you my darling.

Secondly, to the wonderful, talented and selfless: tigerlily25. I would not have been able to write this without your encouragement, your support and your lack of sleep. I owe you tons honey. Who else would have hand-held me through torture, too much wine, house arrest, and the tricky world of necrophilia? LOL! If anyone has not read the works of this wonderful writer, this wonderful person, I would implore you to do so. Witty banter comes as standard! :)

Reviews, comments and crit are always welcomed and appreciated.

XxX

The nothingness is overwhelming. In the dark, he can barely make out shadows and planes, though his eyes fight and strain against the black. His wrists chafe on coiled rope, wrapped tight and binding, and his ankles bend and bleed onto the dry floor. His voice hoarse with panicked overuse and enforced silence, he chokes his pleas into the empty room.

His head aches. The copper smell makes him retch.

Hadn't there been someone here a moment ago?

Hadn't he been somewhere else?

Music plays in his head and echoes in his ears. He can't quite name it, can't quite remember the lulling melody, the soaring harmony. His muscles clench in argument against their previous battery, but he cannot grant them solace. All he can think about are long tanned legs, arched in practiced elegance, swinging in unconscious innocence that was always belied by her eyes.

He screws his eyes shut. He would rather be tormented and his eyes pecked out then stare another second at the crimson marks that paint the floor, spread like webs and vines, the only thing that seems bright in the darkness.

Biting on his lip until broken skin makes liquid flow against his teeth, he wonders how he ended up here. Did they always end up here?

Could it ever end somewhere else?

XxX

Dim orange arcs of light bounce off of the rain-slick roads and sidewalks, casting the world in a strange, sombre glow as he goes to pick Abby up for their evening together. Though they haven't dated for two years ("We never _dated, _Tony. Six weeks of sex isn't _dating"_), he remains her 'plus one' for all serious occasions. This, despite her recent dalliance with the new, green NCIS agent Tim McGee, who he has only met in passing when picking up his happy Goth from work.

Abby lives on the third floor and there are 33 steps up to her apartment. He knocks on the door with a practiced rhythm and waits.

Abby's dark dress swishes around her knees and her black hair hangs shiny and loose around her shoulders – a change from her regular pigtails. Today is an auspicious occasion. Her lips are painted a deep, dark red and she presses them firmly against his cheek, smoothing her fingers along the soft, well-tailored material of his Ermenegildo Zegna tuxedo.

He teases her. " Emily the Strange is all grown up!" and she chuckles in his ear, allowing him to wrap the black embroidered shawl around her shoulders.

They have known each other for nearly three years – after the case he was working with Metro had crashed head-on with an NCIS investigation - and he ended up working alongside the Navy's cops. He had first been terrified by the sight of her, by the tattoos, scattered voodoo dolls and ear-splitting music, but as he had gotten to know her, they had somehow fallen first into bed, and then into an easy, lasting friendship.

" How's work?" Abby asks, straightening his tie with black painted nails.

Metro Detective Anthony DiNozzo fights to hide the wince. " Work is work."

He cannot hide the circles under his eyes.

XxX

The light, when it finally comes, is blinding. Dark eyes stare at him, and dark fists paint dark marks against his face and limbs and torso. At some point, a tooth is loosened, and rattles round in his jaw until he spits it into the dirt. It lies where it falls, glistening like a shard of bone, like a white flag of surrender. A tombstone; a way of marking his inevitable death.

_Nothing is inevitable. _

XxX

The ballet was Ducky's idea – a fitting way to celebrate his 76th birthday, he argued. And the Israeli Ballet Company had arrived in town only three weeks before, with their much-celebrated production of _Giselle. _Tony had seen the posters around the district – the lithe, limber brunette, caught mid-arabesque, her dark eyes wide and haunting, her limbs stretched and taut. In a passing way, he thought of her as beautiful, like the women in magazines, or the stars of his beloved movies. But she was alien, not part of the pavement pounding, cold coffee, suspect-searching life he led.

Abby kisses McGee on their arrival, making Tony poke her in the side as a tease.

Folding her arms across her chest, Abby pouts her crimson lips. " I knew I shouldn't have invited you."

" The Duckster invited me Abs. That man's loved me since the moment he met me. You dump me, two years later, he still keeps me around."

In the theatre, his knee presses against Abby's and his palms brush the soft velvet of the armrests. He can feel Gibbs' eyes on the back of his head, unreadable bright blues studying him as he tries to sit perfectly stock-still. He half listens as Ducky tells his tales of wine and women and county jails, and is unerringly curious about how on earth Ducky had managed to push a French policeman off a cliff. He still feels Gibbs' steel gaze upon him. He sighs with relief as the orchestra begins to swell and the lights dim.

The Israeli ballerinas are uniformly beautiful. Fused with elegance and exoticism, their movements are drilled and perfect. They bourée across the antique wood of the floorboards in unfaltering unison.

When Giselle enters the state, the other ballerinas are left in the dark. While they are beautiful, she is pristine. Tanned skin is all angles and defiance, raised chin to the ceiling and impeccable timing. White lace ebbs around her body, following the lines of her movement like water lapping against the shore. Dark curls lay slick against her forehead and behind her ears.

She reaches the young man dancing Albrecht, and her face lights up in the perfect impression of adoration. Her steps fall in tandem with his as they twist and turn across the stage, falling in love in a single dance.

Tony is not the only one transfixed.

XxX

He twists in his chair, trying to ease the pressure on his spine, on his legs. His ribs creak and arch, stabbing him gently in the lung, as though in protest. Licking his parchment-dry lips, he finally finds words.

" Who are you?"

From the shadows, the response is swift. " I think the question is, who are _you_?"

XxX

He waits for the valet in the biting winter cold, and huddles against the wind, wishing he hadn't waylaid his overcoat in favour of vanity. His lungs take air in and out, whistling their disapproval, and Ducky shoots him a concerned glance. " Dear boy - " he begins, but Tony cuts him off with his patented 'charm smile' and a firm hand on the shoulder.

" It's fine," he promises with only the faintest trace of a lie. " I got my flu shot yesterday like a good little boy."

As the others leave, the sky is black. Abby's lips are red, McGee's ears are pink, and Gibbs gaze is steady and blue. The moon reflects silver on the water.

" You want me to wait?" Abby's voice rings through the night, and her bright eyes are round and loving. He kisses her on the forehead like a little girl and sends her off. In the end, he waits alone.

Ten minutes later the valet has still not found his car, and he shifts from foot to foot and swallows down his irritation. Most of the crowds have dissipated, so the voice, when it shouts, cuts through the whipping wind.

Instinct and training kick in at the same time, and have him ignoring the baffled valet and setting off at a half run around the corner of the building, his hand floating over his hip where his gun normally rests.

The woman's small stature is belied by the burning look of annoyance in her eyes. Dark curls tumble down the back of a champagne-coloured Macintosh that does nothing to disguise the graceful curves of her body. Tony would have recognised her anywhere – _Giselle. _Her arm is trapped in the heated grip of a man who stands over her. His hair is a flash across his forehead, high and tight, and his looming is close and purposeful.

" Hey!" Tony's voice breaks their standoff, and the man lets go of her wrist. She stumbles back after the release, banging her head on the wall, her shoulder scraping the brick. With a flash of his eyes and spat words that are lost to the wind and encroaching rain, the man takes off into the shadows.

In an instant, Tony stands across from the brunette. His fingers wrap around her shoulders. She flinches, twisting her face away from his. " It's okay," he promises, reaching for his badge as she reaches for her bangs, pushing the long curls back from her face. " I'm a cop."

Her face is sceptical. " Police?"

" Metro Detective Anthony DiNozzo."

The woman known to him as Giselle has eyes that are chocolate and shadows. She licks her lips with a darting pink tongue. " I am Ziva," she finally speaks, and her accent is rich and full of history.

" Are you okay?"

" Thank you, I am fine. I just need to get back to my hotel. Do you know where I can get a taxi from here?"

" You'll be waiting forever," he warns as he falls into step with her, out of the shadows and towards his waiting car. " It was a packed show tonight."

As the valet finally drops his keys in his outstretched hand, her eyes trail from his head to his toes, appearing to size him up. " Could you drive me home?"

XxX

In the corner of the room, in a corner hidden from his gaze and swathed in shadows, a voice groans, the volume ebbing in and out like the tide. The voice is familiar, but unknown, and he tries to call out, but gets no response. " Hello?" he calls, " Hello? Are you all right? Can you untie me? Can you help me?"

The dark corner falls silent.

XxX

In the car the streets are blurred with rain. Blues and oranges mingle and swirl on the windshield, and Sinatra croons gently on the stereo. Ziva-who-was-Giselle angles her body towards his and blows hot breath into her cupped hands. Her curls fall over her shoulders in silky pirouettes.

" So you dance?" He stumbles over the words, hindered by his infatuated teeth and lustful tongue.

Wry amusement spreads like watery ink from the corners of her mouth. " Since I was a young child. Professionally since I was twenty."

He combs through years of words and pictures: images of toe shoes and tutus and biographies of famous spinning women. Anna Pavlova winks at him from the depths of his memory. " Isn't twenty kind of late?"

" After my service," she explains, and her rod-straight back and neatly folded hands suddenly make sense.

" Israeli women serve in the Army," he remembers, picturing her wrapped in khaki, tightly tied hair and his sidearm in her small and slender grasp. " Does that mean you know how to kill me?"

Her fingers dance from his knee and up his thigh, leaving him squirming in his seat.

" In many, many ways."

XxX

The blows are frequent and varied, a barrage against his senses. His voice has disappeared into the dry air, and so when a fist cracks his cheek, he can do nothing but gasp. Bile creeps into the back of his throat like the doubt creeping into his mind.

Will he ever get out of here? Will the bonds ever loosen?

He is hit again, this time with such force that the chair he is tied to topples over. Gravity smashes his head into the floor, and his arms pull so hard against the ropes that he feels his shoulder slide out of joint.

Finally, a scream breaks loose, and rips into the night.

XxX

Ziva's lips are warm and soft, and eager. Her pen scratches out a series of numbers against his skin and his eyes follow the movement, committing the inky lustful pattern to memory. " Can I ask you for coffee?"

" You can ask me to bed."

" Will you say yes?"

Her laughter is low and rich and her lips hover somewhere between his cheek and his mouth. Her fingers still tease his thigh. " No." Then, " But ask me again. Second time is a charm, yes?"

He's too polite to correct her, too willing, if she is, to race towards his desired conclusion.

As she slides from his car into the disapproving marble structure of her hotel, she waves her fingers at him. " Laila tov, Tony."

He watches her disappear. " Buonanotte Ziva."


	2. Chapter 2

Three days find him sitting in his office in downtown DC with a stack of files and a black eye. At lunchtime, Abby appears at his door, pigtails swinging and miniskirt riding up under her black wool coat. Her anger is instantaneous. " What happened?"

He ignores her question until they are sitting across from each other, sandwiches on their plates, french-fries between them. Their weekly lunch practiced down to the most minute detail. She sucks bright red liquid up a straw, and the sound of the rattling ice makes his head ache. " Work happened, Abs."

Lips downturn in a frown that looks out of place on her face. Red lipstick leaves kiss marks on her pickle as it tumbles from her fingers and onto the table, leaving a streak of balsamic vinegar dark and bleeding on the cloth. " You call that work?"

He lets her lean across and touch his cheek, wincing when she presses down. He wonders if the pain is penance for letting himself get into this situation in the first place, but as she returns to her sandwich she brushes his wrist with apologetic fingers.

In the end, they speak of his Giselle, and her Probie, and their previous indiscretions. He teases her about the innocent agent that she is corrupting, and she teases him about the seemingly innocent ballerina that seems to be corrupting him. He buys her a chocolate cupcake just to watch her eat it, and to stall before returning to his office.

As they slip back into his car after eating, Abby finds a small, green woollen glove in the well. She holds it between her fingers. " Yours?" Her voice is teasing and warm, her breath laced with fake fruit, sugar and gunpowder.

" Ziva's," he corrects.

Her eyes are curiosity, and knowing. " You're going to see her again."

It isn't a question, so he doesn't bother answering. Instead, he takes the item from her grip, fingering the worn emerald threads even as he pulls up to the Navy Yard. Leaning over, he tugs her to him, wrapping his arms around her back as hers go round his neck. The bruising on his face seems long forgotten.

" I'll call," he promises, because even though it was only six weeks, two years ago, she is still the main woman in his life. (She is more of a sister now, really, though a sister he has seen naked). He talks to her every day without fail.

" I'll pick up," she promises back. Her lips press against his uninjured cheek, warm and assured.

When the door closes, he watches her walk up to the building. The Security Guards wave and smile at her appearance.

He pulls back onto the District streets with only one mission in mind.

*

Mission! The mission! What had happened to the mission? He remembers sunlight glinting off gun barrels and being face down in the sand. Words in unknown tongues steal through his memory, confusing him even as they fill in the gaps.

Had he been alone? Here in a foreign land?

Still lying on his side he breathes in the dirty floor and coughs out the grit. The person in the dark corner moans again, unseen but not unheard.

At least he isn't alone.

*

Ziva's roommate Oliwia is a dainty, blonde, half-Polish half-Israeli Jew, and at barely over five feet curses in three different languages as she wrenches the door open. " I tell you Sergeant, you are no to - " she begins, but then flushes crimson at the sight of him.

A familiar throaty laugh comes from inside the room, and Ziva sends the small blonde off to the gym even as she pulls Tony in by the wrist. " Did you come to ask me to your bed again?"

" Maybe. You gonna say yes this time?"

She's the first woman who's ever said no to him twice and still kept him wanting. Instead of to bed they go out for drinks, and she tells him about her youth growing up in Tel Aviv as she toys with her tequila, dipping her little finger into the glass and watching the ripples grow. They trade stories of absent fathers (his distant through alcohol and money, hers first through work and duty, and later through death after a heart attack that some would argue was caused by an enemy's poison) and of mothers gone before their time. She tells him about losing her doctor brother to a bombing as a teenager, and her lone responsibility for her sister, the only other one left, and the best one of them to start. Tali is at University in London, gaining a taste for beer and a tolerance for the rain, and emails every day.

Tony drinks until he stops flinching at the bourbon taste, and it starts sliding like silk down his throat and into his fingers and toes. Ziva watches him with dark, hooded eyes and swings one leg beneath her in a slow, tantalising arc, her high, strappy shoe hanging off one heel. She runs a finger around her mostly empty glass to collect the remaining droplets and sucks the sour taste from her skin.

In the end, he doesn't have to ask her again. She takes him to bed, to his bed, and he experiences her firm, pliable dancer's body in all its glory. Sweat-slick skin slides between his hands and tumbles in the night air along with laughter and her curls. They wind around one another on crisp cotton sheets, lips on lips, lips on skin, bodies together and apart and together until he can't remember what it was like not to be wrapped up in her. Words murmur in multiple languages, cries into the dark of surprise and urging and _please don't stop. _

In the morning, when he wakes, his lips taste like salt and lime. And she is gone.

But her number is once again inked into his skin, so he rests his head back on the pillows and closes his eyes.

He can call her later, when his senses are back in order.

*

Work is days of flicking through files and pounding pavements. His phone rings off the hook and buzzes on his belt and his boss rides his ass so hard he can practically feel his nose scraping the floor. Friday night rolls around, finds him chained to his desk, rewriting a report that had been fine the first three times, at least according to everyone who was not Sportelli. The coffee is cold and the neon light flickering and dim.

At midnight his cell lights up and sings, and he flips it open with a sigh.

_Midnight show at the Orion? It's Friday night and I'm wired! A x_

He texts her back with tired aching thumbs spurred into motion by a mind too exhausted to lie.

_Still at work, _he tells her. _Stuck here 'til Sportelli lets me leave. _

Her reply is instant. _Sucks :( Call you tomorrow. Hugs. A x_

A sigh breaks from his throat as he turns back to his computer. Names and dates stare at him along with the same conclusion that he has been fighting with for the last five hours. It's the right conclusion, but it's not the one that his boss wants to see on the paper.

The hard wood of the desk is not a comfortable place for his head, but he rests it there anyway. His eyelids begin to droop. Just five minutes, he promises himself. Then, somehow, he will find the words Sportelli wants him to write. Just five minutes…

*

His eyes snap open. His hands are finally unbound, and somewhere a thin strand of light ekes in, landing on a silver pan of dank water that he chokes down his dry, broken throat. The taste is brackish and makes him flinch and bring half of it back up, mixed with spit and something metallic that he thinks might be blood.

Leaving a trickle in the bottom, he pushes the pan as far as he can with the shoulder that still moves, inching it along the ground towards the shadowed corner. " Hey, hey! There's water. Hey? You awake? You okay?"

There is a low groan and a fingertip snakes into the light. The pan shakes, a drop spills, and is finally pulled into the darkness.

He feels his chapped lips crack as he smiles.

" You're welcome."

*

Lincoln is voyeuristic and austere, solid and unmoving atop his plinth. His marfanoid face is glaring and serious and his stone frock coat billowing. In the not-so-far distance the Kennedy Centre stands waiting for the evening when silk-clad feet and soaring strings will grace its presence. For now, Ziva and Tony stand at the top of the stairs, her curls long and loose in the drizzling rain, his coat held over both of their heads in an attempt at providing shelter.

" My friend Abby told me his hands spell out 'A' and 'L' in American Sign Language."

" Really?" She's truly curious. The daytrip had somehow been her idea, a respite between a morning rehearsal of sweat-soaked limbs and an evenings' performance of grandeur and skill.

" Apparently." His shrug shifts the jacket, sending raindrops like bullets down their backs and onto the concrete stairs beneath them. " I don't know Sign."

They cock their heads in unintentional unison, observing the limestone likeness and watching other tourists shelter from the rain beneath the Doric columns.

" So are you going to tell me who he is?"

The unknown man from that first night at the ballet had been waiting in the hotel lobby when Tony arrived, hovering between a potted fern and the desk, a watch cap pulled low over his hair and an impatient look on his face. He hadn't noticed Tony, but Tony had noticed him. With a snap of a cell phone camera his photograph had been sent tumbling through cyberspace, the recipient a raven-haired girl who owed him a favour or two, and had easy access to facial recognition software.

Ziva's eyes are startled and round and her mouth opens and closes without sound. A raindrop falls from her nose, following the curve of her cheek before disappearing between soft, pink lips. " You did not ask before."

" I'm asking now."

His arms ache as he holds the jacket above both their heads, but he does not move. She stares up into the face of the 16th President and avoids Tony's eyes. His gut niggles as she speaks, as unspoken reams of truth flow from her bare-bone tale. " He is a man who was once stationed in Germany when I happened to be on tour there. Our paths crossed. Uncrossing them is proving more delicate than I had anticipated."

The deep breath, when he takes it, expands his ribs and brushes their sides together. Creeping material inches up his skin, and he is somehow not surprised when her fingers find the bare flesh beneath damp cotton, and skate along it. " Are you afraid of him?"

Her laugh is honest and assured, and her cold fingers splay on his warm back. " He is just another man," she reminds him, her thumb caressing his spine. " Why would I be afraid?"

Tony's memory races through cases and bodies and scenes of crimes involving women who 'weren't afraid', and he holds Ziva a fraction tighter against him.

Lincoln keeps his stoic silence, and watches as two lovers press their lips to one another in the rain. In the alcove, a dove spreads its wings, and hoots a warning into the coming storm.

The rain is unrelenting.

*

Against his ribs, the boot is unrelenting.

He inhales dirt and sand that coat his nose and mouth, and for a moment he wonders if he's going to die suffocating.

When it stops, he's relieved, until he hears the heavy footfalls, and the crying from the corner.

Then his mouth is washed clean with the taste of shame and bile.

*


	3. Chapter 3

Abby and Ziva meet each other one night in Georgetown. Their dark heads bob together and whisper giggling secrets from tall stools, pale ankles hanging next to tan calves, glasses stacked like card-tower castles on top of the scarred wooden bar.

Tony stands next to McGee, who looks awkward, and smitten, and young. They try to make small talk but it keeps getting smaller, shrinking and diminishing until it disappears from their lips as infinitesimal particles of silence. After that, they drink, and watch the girls in mutual understanding.

McGee has written a book. Tony knows, because Abby's secrets break like spun sugar before him, and she laughs that there's a character in it who acts a lot like him. As they sip their respective beverages, Tony wonders if the young agent is taking notes. Martini, with vodka, shaken not stirred, like Bond, but always Connery's Bond. Who else would be worth emulating enough to get past the acrid taste?

The liquor goes to his head after the fourth drink, and he steals the seat next to Ziva – finally vacated – and wraps his arm around her waist. Honey sunshine lingers on the skin of her shoulder, and makes the kiss he presses there intoxicating.

The conversation goes far over his head but he observes them talking like one watches animals in a zoo. Only when McGee turns to face him, eyes round and curious and tinged with envy or anger or regret does he switch back on.

" You slept with her?"

There's no clarification as to the subject. Tony looks from woman to woman, from exotic, seductive smile to wide, amused grass-green eyes framed thick and dark. He props himself up to sitting, and decides it's easier not to lie.

" Yes," he admits. " But does that come as a surprise?"

*

When he finally discovers the name of Ziva's stalker, he feels nothing like pride. Because it isn't a result of his persuasive or detective skills, or even of Abby's talent with technology. Instead, the name comes as a result of Ziva's guilt; after a hard evening practicing her _Entrée _on uncooperative feet_, _she returns to her hotel to find the lock kicked off her door.

Her roommate Oliwia is curled on the floor, hand held gingerly against her potentially fractured cheekbone, her nose bleeding and her down-turned Polish lips hysterical and afraid.

It's testimony to Ziva's months in the country that she knows exactly what number to call. And testimony to her tight, overly calm tone of voice that Tony drops everything on his desk and makes it to her hotel in half the time it should have, given the traffic.

He finds the two women curled around each other on the floor, and her lips finally form the name.

" Steven Lock." Ziva's eyes skate around the room, refusing to meet Tony's, and her arms encircle the small blonde girl who trembles and weeps on the cold tiled floor of their bathroom, unrelenting on fragile dancers' bones. " His name is Sergeant Steven Lock."

Cornsilk waves mingle with coffee curls and soothing murmured Hebrew, and Tony feels brutal and awkwardly large in the confined space. His face glares back at him from the mirror, and for a moment he's surprised by his own countenance.

He doesn't remember looking this old.

*

The building that houses NCIS is square and efficient. Tony has never understood the decorative choice to paint the interior walls such a vibrant shade of pumpkin, but while he listens to Abby and her boss Gibbs take turns in berating him, he thinks they've never before been quite so fascinating.

" You should have _called." _

Abby's voice is pleading and cross and worried and her painted fingernails whisper over the web at her neck. A red straw hovers by her lips, chewed and sticky.

" It's not the first time he's broken into her home." Gibbs is direct and curt, and carries an air of confidence, caffeine and sawdust. He stands with a notebook in his hands, words scrawled across it, painting stark pictures of their current reality.

" Germany," Tony nods. Sitting side by side on the thinly carpeted floor, their backs pressed against Oliwia's mattress, there had been a lot of time for confessions and truth. Through the night, the moon had scaled the sky and ensconced itself in the midnight clouds.

Ruby painted lips ask the question. " What happened?"

He shrugs. "As she puts it, she was a twenty three year old kid from Tel Aviv in Europe for the first time. She met him in some club, and they had a couple months together before the Company left for Paris. He's from the Middle Of Nowhere, Arizona, and she didn't think they'd ever see each other again."

Gibbs' gaze is steel and unwavering. " They did."

" Yeah, turns out he's been transferred back to DC and saw the posters for _Giselle. _Thinks they ought to be able to pick up where they left off." The idea makes Tony shudder; he stifles it with a jaw-freezing clench.

" They knew each other a couple months?" Gibbs sips his coffee, staring over the rim of the store-bought paper cup.

" Then she was back on the road. I guess he fell in love, she didn't."

" You think so huh?"

" Yeah."

One silver eyebrow snakes up Gibbs' forehead, taking lodgings near his hairline and casting aspersions to the room.

" How long you been with her DiNozzo?"

*

The nights can't come quickly enough.

In the days, the beating sun is high and unrelenting. The room bakes, intensifying the stench of musk and piss and fear. At night, as the temperature drops, there is a brief reprieve.

Shivering, broken and cold, he huddles into the corner of the dirt walls. Ribs shift and grate under his skin, and his eyelashes stick together with sweat and blood that does not come away no matter how hard he rubs his one working hand across his face.

Unbound, he tries to drag himself towards the far corner, to his companion, to check for life or death or existence, but he moves barely three feet before his body gives out. Collapsed against the frozen ground, he spits blood into the dirt.

" I'm sorry," he whispers into the open air. A single tear runs down his nose and splashes against the dusty floor. " I'm sorry."

*

In the morning she stretches naked.

Her lithe body contorts into magnificent shapes and pulls into unerring lines, and muscles ripple like water under the dappling sun. He lies in bed, sheets kicked down about his waist, eyes cracked barely a millimetre as he pretends to sleep but secretly watches her beneath his lashes.

As she bends over, her back to him, he springs. Arms wrap around her waist and pull her down on the bed in a flurry of limbs, shrieks and bubbling laughter. In the tussle, she ends up straddled over him, pinning his arms on the downy pillows above his head.

" Uncle, uncle," he pleads, and she releases him. He reaches up and pushes her curls back from her face, tangling them in a knot in his fist.

Her eyebrow rises in a perfect arc and she arches her spine against him. Breasts hang just out of reach of his lips, like ripe, forbidden fruit. " I am not your uncle, Tony."

He is about to clarify, but she presses a kiss to his hot mouth to prove her words, and somehow his explanation of the idiom gets lost in pink lips and taut skin and mussed Egyptian cotton sheets.

When they lie again, together stretched and sated, he presses a kiss to the back of her neck. " Ziva?" he whispers, so softly that his words barely move a strand of her hair. " You gonna make me fall in love with you and then leave?"

Turning over, she places a hand on his cheek, feeling the stubble against her palm. Her eyes are dark. " I am not making you do anything."

They are both people of transience, and somehow, her answer seems enough.


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Just to say thank you for all the reviews so far. I had a little target for myself to reach 20 reviews – as I never had before – and I want to thank each and every one of you who helped me make it that far!

This part goes out, as the others do, to tigerlily25. A thank you can't ever be enough, honey. *huggles and contraband pizza* just for you.

*

Tony has always found Gibbs intimidating. His blue gaze is unwavering and it tracks Tony and Ziva's steps from the elevator to the bullpen without as much as a blink. Tony almost cracks a smile as he feels Ziva's small gloved hand slide into his and her fingers grasp tightly.

" DiNozzo," Gibbs greets in a neutral voice, nodding at the younger man in his heavy overcoat. Tony's fairly certain that Abby has read Gibbs the riot act on being pleasant, and he wonders why the young Goth isn't there to greet them. The room brims with agents hunched at computers, flicking through files and answering shrill, insistent phones.

Ziva holds her hand out and her chin up, unflinching despite her unease. " I am Ziva David."

Despite his years of experience as a detective, Tony can't read Gibbs. He wonders if anyone can. But something in the older man's face shifts at the mention of her name, and his gaze seems to intensify. " Miss David," he acknowledges, taking her hand briefly in his. " I knew your father."

Though Tony is aware of Ziva's history - tangled notions of family and Israeli duty - he's knows it's not something she would easily share, and realises Gibbs (and most likely Abby) has put effort into researching her before meeting her in person. He doesn't know whether to feel slightly violated, or cared for, in a strange way.

Though Tony can't read Gibbs, he can read Ziva, and he feels the recoil race through her body at the reference. It is smothered automatically, by training and something like desperation. Her back straightens unconsciously into military posture, her shoulders square. When she speaks, her accent sounds thicker than normal, and he misses the melody that usually laces her tone. " Many did."

Further uncomfortable conversation is halted by a pair of flying black pigtails and exuberant arms that wrap around Tony's neck and squeeze. " Tony!" Abby's voice is a combination of thrill and caffeine and a 5am start. " And Ziva!" she greets just as enthusiastically, her hug looser only by a fraction.

She drags the two of them down to her lab, Gibbs following closely behind as though concerned one of the pair might make a break for the stairs. In the clean, humming space the music thrums, and McGee hammers his fingers against a keyboard, seemingly desensitised to the volume and intent on his task.

" McGee, tell 'em what we've got," Abby requests, sliding into place next to him like the missing piece of the scientific puzzle. He looks at her with wide eyes and a hesitant mouth.

" Uh, Abby…"

When she speaks, her words race and chase and wind around each other. " We looked up Lock's records and it's not good. Citations for breaking and entering and harassment in Germany. He got passed from pillar to post – Iraq to London and DC - before an eventual dishonourable discharge for assault earlier this year."

" Abby…"

" Last known residence was with a buddy from his unit." With a flourish, she holds up a bright yellow post-it note, a grin on her face as she makes eye contact with Gibbs and holds it out to him like a prize, like an apple for a favourite teacher. " Address and phone number."

Tony feels relief well up within him, and almost sighs with gratitude until McGee's hand shoots out and snatches the post-it, crumpling it in his fist.

" McGee!" Abby whips around, punching him in the shoulder without a second thought. " What was that for?"

Finally taking his fingers from the keyboard, McGee studies the people in the room – from Gibbs' impatient frown to Ziva and Tony's nervous fingers interlocked - before his eyes finally land back on Abby. " I tried the number and got his buddy. He hasn't seen Lock for three days."

Looking around the room, the young agent levels gazes with Tony, who feels the bubble of relief burst in his chest, leaving his lungs tight and heaving.

" Lock's gone. He's disappeared."

*

Every day, when he returns to consciousness, he counts how long it takes for him to hear a sound from the opposite corner. Though his eyes are cloudy and his limbs muddled, he whispers the numbers into the open air.

" 206, 207, 208…"

There is moan, and overwhelming happiness breaks over him like a wave. He smacks one palm flat against the dirt and makes a breathy 'whoop!' that leaves him coughing and dazed. His skull rubs against the ground.

The moaning turns to weeping and he stretches out a hand in that direction, fingertips creeping along the dust. " I'm here," he assures the shadows and sounds. The crying continues.

The door opens.

Unable even to lift his head from the floor, he can barely struggle as rough hands yank him up onto unsteady feet. He stumbles, begins to fall forward and is only saved by a savage grip on his hair. He is thrown onto a chair, splintered and hard. One leg is shorter than the other and the seat rocks. One of his shoes is lost.

A bright light shines directly into his eyes.

" Whoa!" He tries to lift a hand to shield his vision, but thick ropes once again lash him to the chair. It seems like a pointless repetition; his muscles are so weak he doesn't think he could stand, let alone run, and this far off the floor the blood seems to run away from his skull. His eyes roll in his head.

A backhand across the cheek makes his bones crack and his mind sputter to life.

" What are you doing here?"

The voice is familiar, but foreign, and hidden somewhere between the shadows and the blinding light.

It's been so long now that he almost gives in. He licks his lips, barely moistening them with a sandpaper tongue, and hangs his head.

He opens his mouth to answer. Then he realises: he has no idea what he's doing here at all.

*

Ziva has been vomiting for three days straight when she finally gives in and lets the Company use her understudy for the day's performance. She shivers and shakes violently on the bathroom floor, a thick blanket wrapped around her shoulders, and orders Tony to leave. Ignoring her words, he kneels down, holding her hair back as she retches into the toilet, surreptitiously taking her temperature with his cool, dry palm.

" You're sick," he tells her, helping her up off the floor when her heaving finally abates.

Rinsing her mouth out with cool, fresh water, she spits into the sink. " I have noticed."

Despite her curt words, she doesn't argue or fight as he wraps his arm around her waist and helps her stumble towards her bed. Yoga pants have been eschewed and a worn, overlarge t-shirt sticks to trunk and limbs of her slender frame. Easing her down onto the bed, he scoops up her feet and tucks the blankets around her body, smoothing her hair back from her sweaty, hot cheeks. Her eyelids flutter closed as soon as her head finds the pillows.

Oliwia hovers in the doorway, jeans tucked into fluffy boots, jacket collar turned up against the chill and a paper sack of groceries in her skinny arms.

" I is having juice," she explains, holding up the carton. " And I is having…" The English word is lost somewhere between muttered Hebrew and Polish, and she holds up a box of Advil instead, one hip cocked and balancing the bag like a peasant farm girl with a milk pail and a pair thick gold braids.

Taking the groceries, Tony steps back, watching as the young girl takes his place kneeling by the side of the bed.

" Ziva?" The tiny blonde shucks off her coat, leaving it in a heap on the floor, and rests her hand against the older woman's flushed face. She waits until Ziva's eyes flutter open before speaking again. When she does, it is in a trickle of gentle Hebrew that Tony cannot pretend to understand. Her fingers brush over the blankets at Ziva's hips and she asks something that is clearly a question.

Feverish laughter is coupled by a swift shaking of the head. Ziva's hand snakes down her body and clutches at her stomach, as though nauseous again. She mumbles, " Lo, lo, lo." Her eyes are glassy.

Instead of waiting and watching for clues to a conversation he cannot understand, Tony goes to find a washcloth, running it under the tap and wringing it out until it is damp but cool. He hands it to Oliwia, sitting cross-legged on the floor, who places it against the skin of Ziva's burning neck. The moan she gets in reply is small, and pained, and thankful.

Blue-grey eyes turn to stare at him from a too-wise child's face. " She is being okay," Oliwia assures him, reaching out and patting his calf without awkwardness. Her other hand strokes through Ziva's hair, easing out tangles and separating curls. " Go you for working, she is being okay."

He nods, and closes the door on the two women. He knows he should go to work. Instead, he stands for a long time with his forehead pressed against the wood, listening to feverish sobs breaking like bubbles through the sound of soothing, lilting Hebrew lullabies.

It does not lull them at all.

*

In the first hour at work, he cannot stop thinking about her. He gets yelled at, phones ring, and a double hole-punch misses hitting him in the head by a matter of inches.

In his third hour of work, a suspect stumbles out from a closet in a supposedly clear room and swings a wrench, and this time he isn't as lucky. The force of the impact hits him like a freight train, and his knees smack the floor without even feeling the fall.

In the fourth hour of work he sits in the ER waiting room alone. Cloying air hangs, stifling and sterile, and makes his heart drum in his chest. Blood trickles down the back of his neck. His fingers dance on the keys of his cell, tracing out first Ziva's number – but he can't bear to wake her, she's sick, she needs to sleep – and then Abby's.

" Tony!" Her bright voice trills through the tinny speakers. " What's up?"

" I'm at the hospital."

She doesn't even reply before hanging up, and he knows he can count to the second how long it will take her to get there.

In the sixth hour of work a doctor shaves the back of his head. His vanity shudders. Abby's fingers lace through his and clench tight. " It'll grow back," she promises - needless but reassuring nonetheless - their hands resting jointly on her knee. The coarse wool of her miniskirt scratches his knuckles. At the sight of the needle she winces, burying her head in his shoulder, and he laughs. A much-tattooed Goth, afraid of needles. The irony is a killer.

After eight hours of his work day, Abby leads him out of the hospital, her arm firm and solid around his waist, holding him straight as he lightly sways. The painkillers have kicked in, and his mind feels clouded and fluffy.

" I'm driving you home," she tells him, her tone inviting no argument.

" My keys are at work."

Eight hours and thirteen minutes into his work day, he and Abby pull up outside the police station. She holds his arm tightly, steering him: a steadfast rudder on a boat sailing blindly into a storm. He wiggles his fingers in her face. " My fingers are finging."

Laughter bubbles up her throat, spilling out onto her ruby lips, and he is joining in, mirthful and giddy until he rounds the corner into the outer office and finds his boss standing, fisted hands on oxen hips, staring down at a small blonde, whose pale face is streaked with tears as she rambles in broken, panicked English.

Oliwia.

The confusion falls away from him in a split second as the drugs wear off. His feet are rock solid as he approaches her, grabbing her shoulders. He ignores Sportelli's reprimand, can't hear Abby's surprise. All his focus is on Oliwia's lips, on the words that fall like shards of broken glass and scatter in the space between them.

" I come home," she begins, nerves and guilt burbling, making her words lodge in her mouth, trip and tangle in her teeth and tongue. " Door no locked. No letter. No phone. No message. I no know."

" Oliwia," he shakes her roughly, dislodging her language, her meaning. At barely five feet she is a rag doll in his hands.

" Red on the floor." She can read his confusion, and grasps at his wrist, pointing at the veins running under his skin. " On the floor, on the bed. Red, red, red." She presses the heels of her hands into her eyes, hard enough to drain the colour from her fragile skin when she pulls them away. " He come back."

" Oliwia!"

Her blue-grey eyes are storm clouds, and her tears fall like rain between petrol lashes. " Tony, I sorry. He come back. Ziva is gone."


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to put this on story alert, author alert, or to review. I really do appreciate it.

I hope you do continue to enjoy the ending!

*

The drive through the city is at break-neck speed. Oliwia sits hunched next to him, her hands covering her eyes and occasional prayerful mutterings slipping out between her close-pressed lips. He has one hand on the wheel, one hand dialling and re-dialling his phone as he is met again and again with only the sound of Ziva's voicemail. He curses loudly and crudely, enough to make Oliwia – even with her limited English – gasp and bite her lip, and he throws his phone towards her. She catches it with more luck than dexterity.

Tony knows Abby and McGee are tracking Ziva's phone as they speed down the freeway. The SatNav is absurdly calm as it speaks to him from the dashboard, guiding him to the Navy Yard. It makes his broken skull throb.

Gibbs waits on the sidewalk as Tony pulls his car up to the building. He's got the door thrown open before the engine even fully stops, and as his feet tumble onto the pavement his tie flies over his shoulder like a banner, like a waving broken heart. Oliwia follows behind him, her arms wrapped around her slender waist, pale hair falling forward and hiding her face from the outside world.

The silver head is lifted with narrowed eyes that Tony is sure would be shadowed with concern if it were anyone else. But he's not sure that Gibbs does concerned, especially not for anyone who isn't Abby, and so he tries not to look directly at the penetrating gaze.

" Anything?" Tony's breath is ragged, as though he's run the distance from the Metro PD office to the Navy Yard, instead of driving. His lips are faintly blue and his hair is still smattered with drying blood, and Gibbs wonders for a moment if he should call Ducky, but Tony's face is hard and drawn, and he finds he has to answer.

" Nothing yet. Abby and McGee are on it."

Tony's eyes are wide, red-rimmed and depthless. His chest rises and falls, and he doesn't flinch as Oliwia's arm slides around his waist, gripping tightly at his shirt-tails, like a small child worrying a blanket.

" They better get on it fast."

*

It's horribly quiet. Beyond the quiet of sunny Sunday calmness, beyond the quiet of tiptoeing late nights and whispered giggles. As he hangs forwards in the rickety chair, the ropes pull at his weary, mangled arms, and he realises that the lack of sound is the silence of death.

Footsteps echo. Heavy booted footfalls thunder in his ears, and because he doesn't have the ability to shut down his hearing, he screws his eyes shut and ducks his head to his chest, burying his chin against sweaty, purpled skin. His head swims.

The door unlocks with a series of heavy clicks and clunks, and slams open. He tenses his body against the expected blows, his breath held tight in his chest that screams protest with the effort, but instead of feeling the grasp of brutal hands on his skin, he instead hears a cry ripped from the shadowy corner.

He risks a glance from under his leaden eyelashes. A new chair sits across from him, empty and glaring. A body, a pile of bones and flesh and rags, is dragged from the shadows and thrown onto the fractured wood.

He screws his eyes shut again and tries to pretend that he cannot hear the fists raining down on bare skin and the broken, desperate howls.

If he's living in the quiet of the grave, he wonders if he will be lying in it alone.

*

It worries Tony that Lock has not even tried to hide. Ziva's cell phone remains on, and it takes Abby less than ten minutes to locate the signal; it comes from a warehouse in McLean, strong and constant and unmoving. Abby's face is pale and her Caf!Pow remains untouched on her workbench as she calls up the map, pinpointing the position. She reaches out, her fingers ghosting Tony's arm, but he's checking his gun in his shoulder holster and racing out of the lab before she's even finished speaking.

" Be careful!" she cries after him, plaintive and brimming with concern and love, and as he steals a glance over his shoulder, he sees her standing side-to-side with Oliwia. Black and white, full of shadowed angles and glaring planes; both women wear identical masks of unmitigated, frozen fear. He wonders if he should have stopped to hold them.

The only reason he agrees to get in a car with Gibbs is because his driving is legendary. Calculating in his head, Tony knows it should take them thirty-five minutes to get to McLean. With Gibbs' driving, it should be closer to twenty.

Unending freeway seems to stretch before them, full of clamouring cars fighting towards their destinations, and he curses under his breath in every language he knows. His stomach roils and rolls.

McGee sits folded in the backseat, his computer keeping a constant connection both to Ziva's cell and to Abby's lab. His jaw is set and resolute.

Gibbs stares forwards as he drives. None of the men say anything.

The scent of jasmine tickles Tony's memory and he clenches his fists hard enough to draw crescents of blood from his palms. He clenches his teeth so his ears pop. Why hadn't he moved Ziva from the hotel when he had first found out about Lock? Why hadn't he stayed with her? Why had he let her convince him that she was safe, that she didn't need his protection?

Why had he listened?

They race on. Scenes flood past his eyes as the blood surges in his ears. The cold metal barrel of his gun presses firm and constant at his side.

Brakes squeal and kick up dust as they reach the warehouse. His hand is on the latch of the door when a firm, unmoving grasp on his shoulder stills him. Blue eyes stare.

" I don't have to tell you not to do anything stupid, do I DiNozzo?" Gibbs asks, and for the first time that Tony can remember, his voice seems almost warm. It's bitingly incongruous, until he looks closer in Gibbs' eyes. They swirl with death, and Tony has to tear his gaze away. He won't accept empathy from someone who has already lost.

He keeps his voice steady and short. " No."

McGee looks at odds with a gun in his hand, but his grip is firm and his arm straight and strong. He keeps against the wall of the warehouse as Tony and Gibbs approach the door from opposite sides, and nods his head once more as he reads the phone signal coming from inside.

They burst in with a flurry of badges and shouts and muzzle flashes. Bullets ricochet within the cavernous interior, and send the three men diving for cover. In the middle of the room, Lock stands, gun in each hand, whip of dark hair across his face. One gun points forward, at each of the men in turn, but it isn't the gun that Tony's eyes focus on.

The other barrel points directly at a head of mussed, brown curls as it snaps up. Eyes burn dark and wide in a battered, bloody face.

" Ziva."

There must be something in Tony's voice that gives it all away. His desperation, his fear for her. Lock's eyes narrow and his gun presses hard against the back of her head. " This is who you'd give me up for?" he spits into her hair. His words are angry and defeated and sharp. " You ruined everything, you stupid whore."

From then, it all happens quickly. He hears Gibbs' voice, placating, warning Lock. He hears the muted cocking of McGee's sidearm. He hears Ziva's silent whisper as she stares at him, her eyes brimming with apologies and tears, and something that could perhaps have been love.

The sound of the bullet comes before any of them can prepare themselves. Blood and brain matter explode across the floor, painting the room in stars of spattered crimson and grey. Without thought, his legs burst forward and he races across the room, gun thrown to the side. He knows Gibbs has made the kill shot as another body falls heavily to the floor somewhere to his left. A black and white scarf flutters against a dead man's neck.

But Tony doesn't care.

His knees hit the ground with unrestrained force and his hands scrabble at the stained concrete, collecting her up. Her name falls from his lips once, twice, three times as he pushes her hair back from her face, gently, so gently, ignoring the stark trails of scarlet left on her marble skin. Her eyes stare up at him, and he finds himself shaking, body trembling as his arms freeze around her unmoving frame.

Water drips on her forehead. A hand touches his shoulder.

" I'm sorry, DiNozzo."

On the floor of the warehouse, her still-warm body is baptised with his broken tears.

*

A broken scream has him forcing open his eyes. His mind is heavy with fog and confusion, and he takes in jarring strained breath. The light is muted, and the figure in the opposite chair is curled in on herself. Heavy masculine hands grip at bloodied thighs purple with blossomed bruises. They knead and paw, pushing against knees that try without success to stay locked together.

He watches as the woman grasps at shreds of material, trying to hide her tanned skin. As hands are grabbed and finally bound behind the chair, the room is filled with the sounds of muted, defeated sobs.

He doesn't want to watch, but his eyes grow accustomed to the light of their own accord. He sees stretches of smooth skin grate and thrash against a hairy, looming chest. Delicate ankles twisting and writhing as they fight against their bonds. Dark, matted curls falling over a bruised and bloody face.

He tries to turn his face away, unable to watch, but unable to block the heavy, heaving grunts and the almost silent gasps of falling tears.

The sound of ringing metal sings in his ears. In the dusty, darkened room, the blade gleams like it was made of starlight.

Pressed against her skin, it draws a thin line of darkness, which blossoms on her neck, spilling down and mingling with the delicate star and chain of her golden necklace. She cries out, to the darkness, to God, to him, and he finds himself unable to tear his eyes away from hers.

" Say goodbye," their Captor requests as he pulls the knife in a single, swift move.

Her final gasp is lost in the silence. It bubbles up, cut off and drowning as crimson spills down her bare chest and drips onto the packed-dirt floor.

Her body hangs against her bonds.

His body hangs against his, and he vomits into the dust.

*

In the back of a C130, engines begin to roar. Somali soil disappears far behind them as they rise into the sky, and Ziva's hipbones stick practically through her skin as he finally relinquishes his hold on her.

Gibbs' firm, father's hands had steered her into a seat as soon as they entered the plane, laying her head down and smoothing her hair back from her face. He talks to her in murmured words that are lost in the altitude and beneath the machine's great hum; words that Tony cannot hear, though he fights to. She curls up, facing away from him, from them all, and he can't help but stare at the back of her head. He still can't believe she's alive.

With truth serum coursing though his body, he is suddenly unable to lie, even to himself. Looking at her beaten, broken body, remembering her haunted eyes as they ripped the bag from her face, he knows things are never going to be the same. Somewhere between Washington and Israel and Somalia, she has been left to crumble and disintegrate, and scatter like sand to the fierce desert wind. He doesn't know if they'll be able to find all the pieces, to put her back together.

He closes his eyes, tries to clear his mind, but her face won't leave him. He feels his body shudder in his seat as he slips into dreams.

He is in a world, and she is there, and they are themselves but not. Ropes pull against battered skin and feet dance like feathers across wooden floors. In dreams, he knows the hot feel of her lips against his, and the sickening stench of her blood.

He trembles, even as he sleeps.

" DiNozzo."

The voice is sharp and quiet. He opens his eyes to find himself the focus of a pair of keen, bright blue eyes. He inwardly groans, biting on his lip against words and truths that threaten to burble and spill. " Yeah Boss?"

Gibbs' head cocks to the side, and for a moment his eyes dart to the small, curled figure in the corner. Her legs are pulled up tight to her body. " Not your fault," is all he says.

In Tony's mind eye he hears glass smash and bullets burst and feels cold concrete at his back and a well-aimed muzzle against his chest. He flinches against the memory of betrayed, hurt-filled eyes. " Yeah, Boss, it is."

" Couldn't have changed things."

" Yeah I could've. Somehow I could've." His fists are clenched against his thighs, his voice low in deference to her injured unconscious and McGee's innocent sleep.

" How? Never met her?" The words are blunt, thrown into the air. The possibility lingers, and burns in his chest and throat. He doesn't meet Gibbs' gaze.

" Maybe."

Blue eyes narrow. " Would you have taken her place?"

" Yes." There is no hesitation in his answer. It breaks forth like the morning sun on the horizon.

" Would it have made a difference?"

He wants to say yes. He wants to say that somehow this is all his fault, that somehow if only he had made a different decision weeks, months, even years ago, he could have somehow spared her this pain. But with the truth serum burning in his veins, and dreams still foggy in his mind, he knows his answer.

The deafening sound of a bullet and the feel of his arms around her still-warm body.

The sight of a silvery blade, and the acrid taste of vomit.

" None of it would have made a difference at all."


End file.
